


Hold it together as we fall apart

by tbat



Category: Xenoblade Chronicles 2 (Video Game)
Genre: F/M, bandages/general Healing Each Other content, uh oh it's disgusting fluff time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-09
Updated: 2020-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:21:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23086207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tbat/pseuds/tbat
Summary: Rex and Pyra spend a typical evening dressing their wounds.
Relationships: Homura | Pyra/Rex
Comments: 9
Kudos: 39





	Hold it together as we fall apart

**Author's Note:**

> WOW BEEN A HOT MINUTE HUH. it's been way too long since i threw out some pyrex trash so please,,,,,enjoy the meal
> 
> title is from chvrches' hit song "death stranding" from the hit hideo kojima video game "death stranding"

A small, bright flame crackled a few feet away from Rex, steadily burning the wood beneath it to a fine ash. His eyes had remained fixed on it for several minutes now, watching it with a fascinated gaze.

It wasn't like any fire he'd seen before. It was too controlled, too  _contained._ Where a normal fire would chaotically spit and flicker upwards, this one remained low and small, almost withdrawing into itself. It more resembled the electronic lights that lined the streets of Alba Cavanich than a real flame. In a way, the fire reminded him of the person who had created it. Calm- serene, even- yet still burning with an intense brilliance within.

"Ready, Rex?" called a gentle voice, pulling him out of his trance. His eyes snapped away from the fire in an instant.

He turned to look at the girl that had preoccupied his thoughts these last few minutes, sitting a few inches away from him on the log they were both sharing. An assortment of bandages and brown, weathered flasks had been laid neatly in front of the both of them. One of the flasks was clutched in her hand, pouring a small blob of ointment into the palm of her other hand.

"Yep, all set," he replied with a nod, holding his arm out in front of her. A pair of shallow cuts marked it- a small scratch near his shoulder, and a larger cut curving a long, thin arc across much of his forearm.

They weren't particularly serious injuries, or even all that painful, really. If anything, he was expecting the  _medicine_ to hurt more. They were just part of the standard cuts and scrapes that were inevitable when you spent half your day fighting your way through the local wildlife. His injuries were minor enough that Nia could have easily closed his- and, by extension, Pyra's- wounds with a single healing Art.

This fact had not gone unnoticed by Nia, who had repeatedly reminded them that she could wave a hand and have their arms pristine and cut-free before Dromarch had even realized his ether was being channeled, to no avail. They had both been quite insistent on this matter: they'd be doing this the old-fashioned way. No Arts, no ether, no healing Blades -or their Drivers- providing backseat medical advice and telling them how to properly treat cuts.

The ointment now spread evenly across her hand, covering her fingers in a thick, translucent coating of liquid, Pyra brought it closer to his arm. Her own arm was an exact mirror of his, the same cuts painting the same bright red lines along her skin. With her free hand she gripped Rex's as lightly as she could, holding it steady. Her fingers carefully curled around his forearm, splaying out awkwardly in an attempt to avoid even brushing against his injury.

Pyra lowered her ointment-coated fingers onto the smaller cut, her hand moving with a slow, measured caution, as though Rex's arm was made of fragile porcelain. He could barely even feel her touching him, the sensation of her fingers gliding across his skin like a gentle breeze masked by the growing sting of the ointment as it was rubbed into his injury.

A pained hiss slipped out before he could suppress it. His arm twitched in a short, sharp shudder. Pyra immediately withdrew her hands.

"I'm sorry!" she exclaimed, an anxious frown forming on her lips. "I must have rubbed it in too hard..."

"No, no, it's fine! I just overreacted is all. Here." He presented his arm to her, taking care to keep it as still as possible. "Won't happen again, I promise."

"Alright..." she said, a tinge of remorse still in her voice. She held onto his arm again to help him steady it. "I know it hurts, but try and bear with it, okay? It won't take long. Besides..." She smiled at him, her tone growing more playful, "I'm sure a big, strong salvager like you can handle it, right?"

"What? 'Course I can," Rex said, raising his voice in blatantly feigned indignation.

"Well, if you say so..." Pyra said with a soft laugh, prompting a chortle from Rex as well.

Grabbing Rex's arm to steady it once more, Pyra resumed her task. This time, though, her fingers brushed the cut with an even lighter touch, their presence so faint as to be almost unnoticeable. The heat that constantly emanated from Pyra, bathing his skin in a soothingly warm sensation, was the best evidence he had that she was even touching him at all. She dragged her hand across his injury in a slow, smooth motion, taking the utmost care to ensure she never accidentally pressed too hard into his flesh. Her teasing aside, Rex could tell Pyra was going out of her way not to cause any more pain than necessary. She was applying the ointment at a steady, even pace that would ensure she didn't rub too much in at once and cause another sharp rush of pain.

It still hurt a little, of course, and every now and then Rex would allow himself a quiet hiss or a sharp gasp for air as she travelled further along each cut, but Pyra was so careful, so  _gentle_ with him, that the pain quickly faded from his notice. The tension the sharp sting of the ointment had brought him drifted away, replaced by a relaxed tranquillity.

He silently stared at Pyra, transfixed as she began to work on the longer cut. His eyes drifted towards her own, shining bright with intense concentration. And yet, she was looking at his arm- looking at  _him-_ with a soft tenderness in her eyes, as though making sure he was okay was the most important thing in the world to her right now. It was a sight he'd seen dozens of times by now, but he still couldn't help but be mesmerized by her, no matter how many times this happened.

All this had become something of a routine for them by now. Every night, once they'd set up camp or arrived at an inn, Rex and Pyra would sit down together, she would clean and dress his wounds, and then he'd do the same for her. Any serious injuries- things beyond the minor cuts and scrapes their small stash of ointments and bandages could take care of- would be left to Nia and Dromarch, naturally. Otherwise, they were happy to take care of it themselves.

Pyra had finished with the ointment by now, wiping her fingers clean with a nearby piece of cloth. She picked up a small roll of bandages, unwinding a strip of it. Bringing it to Rex's arm, she pressed it against his skin and began wrapping it across the smaller cut, repeatedly rolling it over and under his arm in a tight circle with precise, practised movements. Soon enough, the injury had been fully covered, she tore the bandage away from the rest of the roll, and began to repeat the process for the second cut.

It wasn't exactly  _efficient,_ Rex had to admit. If they had caved in to Nia and Dromarch's (primarily Nia's) demands and let them handle it, their wounds would've been dealt relatively effortlessly, and within seconds, rather than the several painstaking minutes the pair of them would spend on the task.

But this just felt far more intimiate, far more  _personal_ . They already quite literally shared in each other's pain, but there was something about placing that pain, that vulnerability, into Pyra's hands, and knowing he could trust her with it, and that she trusted him in turn, that just made him feel...closer to her. It made him feel as though they were truly  _partners._ Like they could share in everything together. They rose to the same highs, and when they fell to the same lows, he'd be there to pick her back up, and he could rely on her to do the same for him.

The sound of a sharp tear indicated that Pyra had finished up, the remainder of the roll placed next to her on the log.

"There! All done," she said. She ran her hand along the bandages covering his forearm, smoothing out a few creases. "How is it? It doesn't feel too tight or anything, does it?"

"Yeah, they feel fine," he said. His face lit up in a sincere smile, his eyes meeting hers. "Thanks, Pyra. I really appreciate it."

Pyra's expression mirrored his own, albeit with a faint streak of red racing across her face.

"Oh, don't worry about it! I'm just glad I could help," she said. Her head lowered slightly, her gaze suddenly intently focused on Rex's arm rather than his face.

Her hand, still resting at the edge of his wrappings, began to pull away from him. The tips of her fingers dragged slowly along the length of his arm as she went, leaving a faint trail of warmth in their wake until she reached his hand and abruptly stopped, her fingers pressed lightly against him.

Rex's breath hitched, his arm tensing slightly at the sensation. The heat had already begun to fade away from where she had traced a line down his arm, but now he could feel it concentrating on the back of his hand, her fingertips creating small pools of warmth where they were touching him.

He glanced up at her face, at the dazed, almost faraway look in her eyes as she gazed down at her hand, hovering just above his.

"Uh...Pyra?" he called out.

Her eyes went wide with shock, as if she'd only just realized what she had been doing. For a brief moment, he thought he saw a minuscule splaying of her fingers, her hand lowering towards his by a fraction of an inch. Before he could register whether it had really happened, though, her hand snapped away from his in a burst of speed.

"Oh! Uh...sorry..." she said, staring down at the ground with her head hung low and her face flushed red. She was biting down hard on her lip, as though she was just barely holding back something that she was desperate to let out.

A heavy silence hung over them, stretching a few quietly uncomfortable seconds into what felt like agonizing minutes. The heat left in Rex's hand lingered on, though he could feel it begin to fade away in the cool night air. He stared down at it with a perplexed look.

Had that really just happened? Had she really just been about to hold his hand? No way, he admonished himself.  _No way._ Why would she even do that? Pyra was his  _friend,_ his  _Blade_ , that's all. He was reading far too much into this. Okay, sure, maybe she'd been acting a little weirdly, and sure, maybe that weirdness had seemed awfully...affectionate, but he was certain she had been acting in a purely platonic fashion. Why wouldn't she?

This was, he told himself, the most sensible conclusion to come to, and was absolutely not a way to distract himself from the fact that the instant her hand had left his, he'd found himself  _missing it,_ found himself wishing she hadn't pulled away from him, found himself wondering how it would have felt if she really had laid her hand on top of his, imagining those tiny lingering patches of warmth she'd left behind spreading and enveloping his entire hand as her fingers entwined with his-

Rex shook his head, as though it would send those thoughts flying out of his mind as quickly as they had raced in, quietly hoping Pyra hadn't noticed the blush burning across his face. Now was hardly the time to be distracted by thoughts like that. Thoughts which, he noted with considerable embarassment, had become increasingly frequent as of late.

He forced himself to speak, if only to try and distract himself from all the voices in his head waxing poetic about Pyra's unparalleled beauty and perfection.

"Do you, uh...want me to start on your arm?" he said, leaning down and picking up the bottle of ointment.

Pyra jerked her head up like he'd shaken her out of a trance similar to his own.

"Oh, um...sure, go ahead," she said with a sheepish smile. The voices' poetry recital became distractingly loud. She lifted her arm up, presenting it to him. "Here."

"Alright then," Rex replied, shifting a little closer. He dripped some of the ointment onto his fingers, spreading it across them just as Pyra had done. Reaching out towards her, he brought his hand to the cut on her upper arm, pressing down onto it. A pained hiss from Pyra accompanied the contact, along with a shudder. He briefly held his fingers in place, letting her adjust to the sting of the poultice before continuing.

Once he was sure she was comfortable, Rex slid his hand across the cut, taking care to match the measured pace Pyra had used to treat him. Small as it was, it didn't take him long to cover the entire wound in ointment, and he quickly moved onto the longer cut marking her forearm. Throughout all of this, he could feel her gaze fixed on him, silently watching him as he worked. A minute passed by, and still her eyes remained unwavering. Frankly, it was starting to make him feel self-conscious.

A stolen glance her way revealed that she was looking at him with  _that_ smile. That smile that always came over her whenever he had stood up for her, that she had shown him on the first night they had healed one another, always with her eyes shining with a quiet joy that was all too rare in her. It was the smile that had increasingly begun to occupy his every waking thought, the smile he wanted to give her a thousand more reasons to show after all those years of solitude and regret. 

How was he supposed to concentrate knowing she was looking at him like  _that,_ stunning all his denial of his feelings- and of even the remote possibility of her sharing them- into awestruck silence? 

The moment his eyes left hers, his shoulders tensed and hunched up, and his hand’s formerly smooth motions became jagged and awkward. His fingers pushed hard against the wound, eliciting a short cry of pain from Pyra.

Rex jerked his hand away from her as fast as he could, leaving it hovering above her arm. Panic instantly spread across his face, and an icy surge of guilt rushed through him, tightening his chest. Accident or not, the thought of causing Pyra even minor pain was one he could barely stomach. He'd felt it just as much as she had, naturally, a sharp, burning pain flaring up in him just as the cry had escaped her mouth.

“Sorry, sorry! I should've been more careful," he said with a worried frown. "You alright?"

A smile forced its way onto her face, breaking through her pained grimace. "I'm alright, Rex." She reached out, her hand wrapping around Rex's wrist and pulling it back down to onto the cut. Another gasp of pain escaped her lips at the contact, but she quickly stifled it. "Just...carry on, okay? I'll be fine," she said, letting go of him.

Rex glanced down at his hand, frozen in place atop the cut and daring not to move. "You sure?"

"I'm sure," she said, her smile wide and encouraging.

Looking back at her, Rex responded with a shallow nod before pressing his hand against her, finally sliding it down the length of the cut marking her forearm. His movements were sluggish, his hand dragging down the bright crimson path laid down by the wound in slow, stilted bursts. It was hardly an ideal pace, and a small part of him was dimly aware of how strange he probably looked to Pyra, but making sure he didn't make the same mistake again was more important than speed right now.

Time drifted wordlessly by, and Rex soon finished applying the ointment. Taking the bandages in hand, he set to wrapping the wounds. His eyes flicked up towards Pyra as he blanketed her arm in the soft, white fabric, trying to gauge her reaction and ensure they weren't wrapped too tightly. To his relief, and increasingly captivated distraction, her expression remained fixed in the same serene smile as before.

"Alright, how's that?"

Ripping the roll free of the bandages winding their way down to Pyra's wrist, Rex shifted back slightly, looking over his work. While hardly  _bad,_ it was, he had to admit, somewhat more...inelegantly executed than Pyra's efforts. Her bandages had been layered thicker and heavier than the ones covering his own arm, and small lumps of bunched up fabric had risen up awkwardly across their otherwise even surface. 

If that bothered Pyra, though, she wasn't letting it show. She had lifted her arm up in front of her, eyes scanning up and down Rex's handiwork in silent evaluation.

"Perfect!" she said. Her eyes lit up in approval as she turned to face him, and she lowered her arm back down as she did so, resting her hand on the log. "Thank you, Rex."

"Oh, uh, d-don't mention it!" Rex replied, lowering his head and scratching the back of it in an attempt to avoid any nervous fidgeting.

His eyes drifted towards her hand, sat not too far away from his own. For a moment, he felt the now long-faded traces of the heat her touch had left behind once again, the memory of her warmth still burning brightly. It was, Rex realized, something he wanted desperately to feel again.

Acting without thinking, even as all the instinctual shyness and embarassment that accompanied even the  _idea_ of anything remotely romantic involving Pyra screamed at him to stop, Rex's hand inched closer to her's, the gap between them shrinking more and more until, at last, it slid on top of her hand.

Pyra's hand jolted beneath his fingers for an instant, and she let out a faint gasp. Beyond that, Rex wasn't sure what her reaction had been. Whatever burst of impulsive bravery had brought him to this point had quickly evaporated, leaving him to stare at his shoes, face incandescently red as what he had just done slowly dawned upon him.

He was holding Pyra's hand. With no warning. Not a word spoken or glance exchanged. Just, out of nowhere, hand-to-hand contact.

The moment he fully processed that fact, he began to move his arm, to snatch his hand away from hers as quickly as possible, a profuse apology already forming on his lips. Just as he opened his mouth, Pyra's hand shifted, slowly turning over. Her fingers pushed between his, tightly entwining them.

Rex's heart rate immediately doubled. A vague, distant throbbing in the core crystal implanted on his chest told him that Pyra's had done the very same. His mind raced as fast as his heart, a whirlwind of disbelief and joy and a lingering sense of complete and total mortification over having  _actually done this_ overtaking his thoughts. Somewhere in all of this, he found time to squeeze Pyra's hand back, the full sensation of it tightly clasping onto his finally hitting him as he did so.

It felt...nice. For as fierce as he knew her flames could burn, for all the earth she could scorch and steel she could melt, the warmth Rex felt radiating off of her was still a comforting, gentle one. It burned intensely, certainly, bathing him in a heat far beyond what any human hands could manage.

But the kindness of its wielder, and the tightness with which she clutched onto his hand, made it clearer than ever to him that all of Pyra's incredible power was the power to protect. He knew it was, no matter how much all her guilt churned away inside of her, like dreary, frigid water dousing her bright flame.

He glanced over at Pyra. She was already looking his way with a shy smile, her face coated in a bright red. Her eyes were lit up with a soft affection, the glow of the nearby fire only enhancing the effect.

"I...um," she murmured, her voice low, "Rex, I think I l-"

As the words left her mouth, Pyra's eyes widened, her free hand flying up to her mouth and stifling a shocked gasp. The flustered look on her face made Rex suddenly become acutely aware of their situation, of their hands still clasped together and the distance between them that had shrunk without him even realizing. Any curiosity he might have had about what she was about to say evaporated in the face of that realization.

That was all it took for complete and total embarassment to set in.

As one, their hands disentangled from each other in a fumbling blur of movement. Rex jerked as arm back, as did Pyra. His eyes remained locked on hers, unsure of whether to look away or not, nor of what to say.

An endless, silent eternity passed them by, even more painful in its awkwardness than the last time. Still their gazes never left the other, as though the pair of them were waiting for the other to make the first move, like gunslingers locked in a life-or-death duel.

Finally, Pyra opened her mouth to speak, a small mercy for which Rex mentally thanked her for profusely.

"So, should I..." she said uncertainly, "Should I get started on dinner?"

A faint wave of relief washed over Rex. She'd given him a lifeline to grab hold of in these choppy waters, and he was all too happy to take it.

"What? Oh, yeah, sure! That'd be great!" he said a little too eagerly. "We've still got some Krabble meat left over, I think."

"Sounds good!" Pyra chirped, hopping to her feet with an uncharacteristic urgency. She walked off towards the rest of their supplies, calling out "I won't be long!" as she left.

Rex waved her off with a fond, if not slightly nervous smile. Lowering it in front of his face, he examined his hand, the warmth Pyra had left behind lingering far more strongly in it than before. His smile widened, despite the blush on his face.

For all the problems that sharing each other's pain could cause them, the bond it helped them share made it all worthwhile.

  
  



End file.
